Category Archives: Uncategorized

Mark Wynne I have been published in Magma, South Bank Poetry, Lighthouse, The Moth and Ambit, where I won second prize in a competition judged by George Szirtes. My first pamphlet, Frank & Stella, was published by tall-lighthouse last year. I had two poems shortlisted for the 2020 Artlyst international award for poetry based onContinue reading “Mark Wynne: Night Fatigue”

Cat Woodward Cat Woodward’s first collection Sphinx was published by Salo Press in 2017, her second Blood. Flower. Joy! was published by Knives, Forks and Spoons Press in 2019. In 2018 she won the Ivan Juritz Prize for Creative Experiment. Cat’s current poetry project is a mytho-history of the city of Norwich. She studied for her PhDContinue reading “Cat Woodward: I feel so sorry for poetry”

Every time a bugsmacks bridge, cheek, or lid,flies into my mouth,I breathe a sigh of relief [Modern Pastoral was first published in Issue 16 of Otis Nebula] Moira Walsh Moira Walsh, born in Michigan, is a freelance translator based in southern Germany. Her first collaborative poem (with Wilfried Schubert) was shortlisted for Magma and subsequentlyContinue reading “Moira Walsh: Modern Pastoral”

Villanelle for the Birds* aaa aaar arp arp aouk ak-ak-ak-ak-akjee jik jik jip jip kee-orrh korrh-korrh-korrh shrreeecaw chaarr chink chack chack chack chick-chick-chick-chick chak wow-wow-wow yowk-owk-owk zeep yah whit tick tacktystie tystie wot-wot wee-ploo-ploo tzitziaaa aaar arp arp aouk ak-ak-ak-ak-akheee-yoch-hyoch-och hicker wicker grraa-graa jackchee-aw chee cheweecho-weecho-weecho-weecaw chaarr chink chack chack chack chick-chick-chick-chick chak shushushushu quickquickquickquickContinue reading “Martin Wakefield: Excerpt from The Blue Villanelles”

Possibly the hardest challenge we have given ourselves yet! We have compiled a list of our favourite reads from the last year. Saskia There were so many wonderful books published in 2020/21 its hard to pick favorites. Here are a selected few of mine. In terms of bigger presses, I absolutely loved Kathleen Jamie’s Surfacing (Sort of Books),Continue reading “Osmosis Picks of 2021”

Sunday 11th April I watch myself rip the zebra-print wallpaperThe whites are brown nicotine-stained by time,Curling at my feet like magpie feathers.A well-fed cat with autumn breath— do you remember that? Each day is a month.I remove every trace of your daughter, strip by strip.Sweets in a jar melting in their plastic wrappersAdded to aContinue reading “Joshua Jones: ‘o’”

inever write a poem about your mother. mother, why didn’t you raise meseaside? mother,why didn’t you sew me wings? mother, mother, this poem has teeth,fingernails, a life i will never carry. mother,brightest, transplanter of gardens, giver of life, a reckoning, a fable.mother, child, unwilling, breathing, barely. mother,child, earth axis turn of quiet survival, of allowedContinue reading “Monica Robinson: the things we inherited from our mothers were borne bright and brassy”

§Catkins press from the willow’s cupped buds. I imagine the crescendo hum of slow and bulbous bees, remember last year’s earlyChiffchaff, whirled among the outer branches, frantic with its migrant hunger. I remember squirrels, too, munching catkins like corn-on-the-cob. How they dangle with afuck-you attitude from their tails. §Last winter, storm winds pulled down anotherContinue reading “Oliver Southall: Excerpt from The Willow’s Eye”

Russian bath house, sophisticated women bathe men, egg yolk and waterBlack Elvis holds court at a country club playing guitar, country bluesWhere would he call home, Washington Square or streets of Nashville?At night he dreams of Las Vegas, classical Mona Lisa and her muse MatteoDance to Joy Division. Sweat seeps into her skin as sheContinue reading “Kofi Fosu Forson: At a Loft Party in Soho, I Stare at David Hockney Painting”

Mike Sweeney  Mike Sweeney’s M.F.A. (1990) from the University of Connecticut began a core interest in social engagement and bridges between visual and textual literacy. His 2019 interview in LandEscape Now! 10th edition was bookended by duo and solo exhibitions at the Hartford Public Library ArtWalk and the Pegasus Gallery at MXCC. In 2020 andContinue reading “Mike Sweeney: Tortoise Maze”